


Red and Gold

by bluerosebouquet



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, M/M, as can pepper, boy oh boy steve is angsty in this, man mans bucky can sense when something is wrong
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 10:16:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18714994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluerosebouquet/pseuds/bluerosebouquet
Summary: The aftermath of Tony Stark saving the Universe.





	Red and Gold

One hour after Tony saved the universe, Steve didn’t let himself think about anything but cleanup and getting the Infinity Stones out of sight and out of mind.  He, Bucky, Sam, and Bruce set up a makeshift lab so that one of them could take the stones back.  

“It’ll take a couple of weeks to set up,” Bruce had said, looking around at all the equipment, “I guess it’s good that it’s summer, less likely to rain.”

Steve nodded.

“Any chance you can get it done sooner?”

Bruce smiled at him, a little sadly.

“I’m not as fast as him.”

Steve simply nodded again, and turned back to the smoking ruins of the compound without another word.

 

He spent hours sifting through the rubble of the compound with the others, greeting those they lost, embracing them.  He didn’t want to seem hollow, or that he wasn’t grateful to see them all alive and safe and...alive, so he forced everything he was feeling into a tiny little jar and put it away in his mind.  And if the jar was gold and red, that wasn’t anyone’s business but his.

Pepper invited a few of them to stay with her and Morgan at their house.  Steve tried to decline with the reason that he needed to stay in the livable part of the compound, make sure it was guarded.  Pepper smiled a little too understandingly, and hugged him so hard he almost broke into a thousand tiny pieces in her arms.

That night, he watched the stones glow in the bunker that Tony had built in case the compound was attacked.  He had a backup plan for everything.  Well, almost everything.  Looking at the stones glowing, Steve had realized he had never experienced real rage, hatred before, but looking at the stones, which were almost innocuous if you didn’t know what you were looking at, Steve hated those stones with everything he had.  He put the rage into the jar, which, even in his mind, was getting kind of full.

Three days after Tony saved the Universe, the jar that Steve kept the swirling storm of emotions he was feeling in was beginning to crack.  He could feel it happening, and knew that a full breakdown in front of the team wouldn’t do anybody any good.  So, he shut himself in a room in the bunker, where he thought no one would find him and he let the jar break apart.  He cried and screamed and threw things at the solid barrier protecting the Infinity Stones from his rage.  

Bucky was the one that found him.  He knew something was wrong.  He didn’t ask, but simply sank to the floor next to him, so they were leaning back to back.

“I don’t know what to do,” Steve breathed.

“You’ve never given yourself time to grieve, Steve.  Maybe it’s time that you give yourself the space to do that.”

“I don’t know who I am without- Without a mission.”

Bucky gripped his hand.

“We’ll figure it out.  Together.”

Two weeks after Tony saved the Universe, they gathered at his house, in dark suits and dresses, and watched his last message to them all.  “Everything is going to work out exactly how it’s supposed to,” echoed in Steve’s head as Tony leaned down to Morgan and said, “I love you 3000.”  Bucky gripped Steve’s shoulder and Steve felt his heart get cut by the shattered remains of what used to be.  Steve had never really gotten used to the future, and the fact that he couldn’t actually reach out and touch Tony, that he was only a hologram, was almost too much to bear.

Steve tried to memorize his face.  He looked at the pictures all around the house and tried to memorize ever laugh line, every dimple, every freckle.  It would have been easier if he was really there.

They walked down to the lake, all of them, with Pepper, Morgan, Happy, Rhodey, and Steve in the lead.  Proof that Tony Stark has a heart.  Pepper and Morgan sent the flowers and the last piece of Tony into the center of the lake with a little push.  And as they watched it float away, Steve thought about the million different ways that Tony Stark had proved that he had a heart.  Not least of which was him saving the Universe.  

But then, there were the other ways, the ways that he and Tony had argued, the ways that they had worked together, the ways that Tony had looked at him, those tiny upgrades that Tony was always making to Steve’s suit after battle.  Steve had seen Tony Stark’s heart a thousand different times, and he cursed himself for never appreciating it while it was here.

He remained at the dock long after everyone else trailed off.  No one bothered him.  Maybe Bucky had told them about him learning to grieve, but he was grateful for it.

Steve shut his eyes so hard it hurt and he let himself get rocked by the waves of the overwhelming loss he had experienced.  Peggy, Natasha, and now?  Tony.  He felt like he was drowning, he was gasping for air, trying to figure out who he was in the world without Tony.  Who would laugh at him for messing up something on his phone?  Who would call him out on his bullshit? Who would he fight for the greater good with?  He was almost swallowed up by it until, in the back of his head, he heard a voice say,

“Come on, Mr. Rogers, if you snap, who’s gonna replace that fine ass?”

Steve looked out at the lake, where the flowers were drifting, and heard the voice say,

“Go get yourself a life.  Whatever it takes, right?”

“Whatever it takes,” Steve whispered, “Tony.”

He looked out towards the lake one last time, took a deep breath, and turned towards the house.

Four weeks after Tony saved the Universe, Bruce had managed to rebuild the time machine, or, rather, make an entirely new quantum gateway, thanks to Tony’s meticulously illegible notes.

Bruce, Bucky, and Sam were getting everything ready, and Steve was looking up at the trees, watching them sway in the light breeze.  he ran his thumb over his picture of Peggy, and then the picture that Pepper had pressed into his hand after the funeral, with a smile and a whispered, “take care of him.”

He and Tony sitting in Avengers Tower, laughing at something.  He had seen Natasha with a camera, but he never dreamed that she was actually taking pictures.  He was more grateful for it than he could say, but he knew she didn’t need to hear anything.  Pepper was wonderful that way.

Bruce called him over to the gateway and he looked at them all, saying his goodbyes.  They thought for only ten seconds, but for him?  Much, much longer.

“I miss him, man,” Bruce said, and Steve looked at him with a clarity and understanding he had almost never known.

“Me too.”

He thought Bucky knew his plan in the way he looked at him, but he knew he wouldn’t say anything.

And with that, he picked up Mjolnir, let his helmet cover his face, and put back the pieces that Tony Stark had used to save the Universe.  And after that?  While he might never be whole, he finally got some of that life Tony was always telling him to get.

**Author's Note:**

> I mean it's angst ridden and sad af, but hopefully I can drown myself in 2012 Avengers Tower Stony fics pretty soon lol.


End file.
